


My shadows dancing without you

by yourlionheartx



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-24
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2019-01-22 08:16:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12477252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourlionheartx/pseuds/yourlionheartx
Summary: Niall’s been waiting for Zayn to come back. Inspired by the song obviously.





	My shadows dancing without you

**Author's Note:**

> Been having a Niall moment. As in the albums been on repeat for four days straight and I literally can't stop thinking about him and the fact that little blonde kid with braces as become an actual beautiful grown man who's writing such heart breakingly lovely songs and I'm gonna go cry over that. So proud.
> 
> Anyway, I love writing about him being in pain for some reason so I'm making a promise to myself that next time I'll write something incredibly fluffy and lovely with cuddles and puppies. Cool. Enjoy
> 
> x

They had a few days off, went back to their homes to see family, old friends, places they were beginning to forget, blurred by every other place they had been calling home over the past years. Zayn turned up at Niall’s house one night and they went out for drinks, they stumbled back to Niall’s, they fucked in Niall’s bedroom, where he used to sit and dream of being famous. They fucked in tour buses, hotel rooms, once in a nightclub toilet, in Zayn’s apartment, in Niall’s. They fucked because they were friends and because they were lonely and not because they loved each other. Niall loved Zayn but Zayn was going to leave when he found another pretty mouth to put on his dick.

And he did, he did leave. He left with a smile, a quick wave, Niall’s heart clenched in his fist, bleeding over his skin.

**

“I think I’m drunk,” Zayn had mumbled into Niall’s hair. Niall hadn’t asked why he had turned up on the doorstep of his family’s house in Mullingar with a duffel bag of clothes. Zayn had a tired look on his face. Niall never asked, never found out.

He could only focus on one thing, and that was how close Zayn was to him, how their thighs were touching and his fingers were trailing over Niall’s arm and leaving goose bumps everywhere they touched.

Niall turned to bury his face into Zayn’s neck. “Me too,” he whispered.

“We should go.”

Zayn took Niall’s hand as they walked. It was reckless. They were so fucking lucky no one saw. He remembers shushing Zayn as they fell into the door, his parents were asleep upstairs. Zayn had steadied himself by grabbing Niall’s shoulders, leaning into him. “I love you,” Zayn had breathed.

“Love you too, mate.”

Zayn shook his head. His eyes dropped to Niall’s mouth and Niall took his chance, his drunken stupid chance to lean in. Zayn pushed him back against the wall, tripping over the shoes by the door, his mouth warm and wet and tasting of beer and cigarettes. His hands were on Niall’s waist and Niall pulled him closer, his hand in Zayn’s hair and the other clutching at his jacket.

“Well,” Niall said when Zayn pulled back. He cleared his throat. “Well then.”

Zayn made a noise in his throat and pulled Niall flush to him so Niall could feel him, half hard already under tight jeans. Niall just opened and closed his mouth, his eyes moving over to the stairs.

“Yeah,” Zayn whispered, nodding and licking over his lips. He smiled and took Niall’s hand, tugging him upstairs towards his bedroom. As Niall followed, he wondered if this was what Zayn had come all this way for.

Zayn had been careful, so lovely, taking everything slow and making Niall feel good, pulling away from heated kisses to ask _Is this okay?_ and _Does this feel good?_ Niall could only nod, gasping out Zayn’s name as Zayn moved inside him. He came so hard, trembling with it and panting against Zayn’s shoulder. They fell asleep holding each other and Zayn was still there in the morning when Niall woke up with his head thudding and his mouth dry.

He pushed Zayn’s hair back from his eyes and, after a few moments of staring, Zayn wrinkled his nose. “Creepy,” he muttered, making Niall blush. He opened his eyes, grinning at him.

Zayn left that day, went back to his parents place for the last day of their break. When they all got back together, Niall wasn’t sure what to expect. He was buzzing before he saw Zayn, but Zayn wasn’t meeting his eye, wasn’t meeting anyone’s eye.

“We should talk,” he said, voice low, when they were finally alone together.

Niall swallowed. “Yeah?”

“Like, we can do – what happened, we can do it again but I don’t wanna mess up what we have, yeah?” Zayn said and Niall’s chest felt tight as he nodded. “You get it? Just sex? I love you to bits, Ni, I do, so we can do it again but we have, like, an agreement that it isn’t – we aren’t dating.”

Niall forced a laugh. “Of course, man, I don’t wanna date you. Jeez.”

Zayn laughed too but his didn’t sound fake.

 

And Niall was stupid enough to carry it on, even though he knew every time he was moaning against Zayn’s lips, every time he went down on Zayn on the tour bus or Zayn fucked him into hotel beds, Niall was falling just a little bit more in love. Every single fucking time, and Zayn wasn’t feeling a thing. He had hope. That’s Niall’s problem. He latches on to people and then he starts to hope. Maybe this time Zayn will stay, maybe this time Zayn will kiss him awake, maybe he’ll listen when Niall’s overwhelmed and muttering _I love yous_ into Zayn’s skin.

He took what he could get in the end, felt damn lucky to have Zayn kissing his neck and telling him he was sexy, when he knew it was gonna end and it was gonna fucking hurt.

 

“Answer the phone, you fucking prick,” Niall mutters for what feels like the one hundredth time in just a few months. Zayn doesn’t answer. The phone keeps ringing. Finally, it goes to voice mail and Niall hangs up. Zayn had told them all, had explained everything before he walked away. Louis got himself into a huff over it and stormed out of the room. Harry looked like he was trying not to cry when he excused himself to follow him. Liam didn’t say a word, just stared at Zayn like he was waiting for the punchline to a shitty joke. When he finally left, Niall looked up at Zayn and Zayn couldn’t meet his eye.

“You’re seriously leaving?” Niall had asked, shaking his head. “Zayn, just wait it out – one more year and we’ll all take a break.”

“I can’t wait a year, Niall.”

 

Harry gives Niall sad looks and Niall hates how Harry seems to be able to read minds. They see the photos of Zayn and his new girlfriend, they hear the new songs playing in shops and on the television. Liam jumps up to find the remote and change the channel, glancing over at Niall because somehow everyone’s seen it. Seen the way Niall looked at Zayn, made excuses to touch him, followed him around like a bloody lost puppy. Maybe they’ve noticed that Niall wakes up, forgetting they’re all sharing a car, or a plane, and he reaches out a hand and lets it drop, opening his eyes and remembering that he’s not there anymore. He’s not sleeping with his head on Niall’s shoulder or sitting next to him and smiling, tapping his foot against Niall’s and telling him he’s been mumbling something stupid in his sleep again.

 

He’s in his own house and he’s holding his guitar but looking out of the window as if he’s waiting. His phone buzzes and it’s Louis _just checking in nialler haven’t heard from you in a bit xx_

Niall doesn’t know how to reply, he hates lying to his best friends, knowing that they’re all worrying and not knowing what to say to him. Niall doesn’t get sad, he doesn’t usually let things get to him this much because life’s too short to sit around and waste time thinking about guys who aren’t thinking about him, thinking about what ifs.

 

It’s six months. Six months and Niall’s writing his own songs. They’re good, he thinks. He’s proud of them, looking forward to other people listening to them. He leans over his guitar, crossing out a line and going to re-write it. There’s a knock on his door. It’s almost midnight. He puts down his guitar, stumbling over his trainers as he makes his way to the door.

And there he is.

Niall’s stomach swoops, his hands shake. He goes to close the door, because he can’t deal but Zayn stops him. “Niall,” Zayn says.

“Fuck off,” Niall says. He can’t look at him. He feels sick.

Zayn doesn’t say anything else for a moment. He stops pushing on the door and so does Niall, and he just stares. Zayn stares back, opening and closing his mouth and Niall wonders why he’s here. Why he came all this way to just stand there and look at him.

Niall was hoping this would happen, but he’s over that now, that hope. He wanted nothing else, just Zayn knocking on his door, Zayn stepping in and saying _sorry, I love you, I wish I’d stayed_ , but now he’s here and it’s six months too late.

“Fuck off,” Niall repeats, but his voice is weaker.

“The guys say you’re not answering your phone.”

Niall sighs because of course, of fucking course. It was Harry or Liam, Niall knows one of them must have called Zayn and he hopes it was Liam, knows Liam would be angrier and make Zayn feel bad. Harry would just be worried and Niall doesn’t want anyone to worry, doesn’t want Zayn to think, to know, this has got to him.

“I’ve been busy,” he says.

“Can I come in, Niall?”

“You can’t make this okay,” Niall says. The fantasy of Zayn coming back and saying all the right things and the two of them falling into bed with each other isn’t ever going to be more than a fantasy, something stupid Niall thought about before he fell asleep. He knows that now that Zayn’s actually here.

“I know,” Zayn says. “I just need – you need to know I’m sorry.”

Niall wants to hit him. “Sorry for what? For leaving? For not answering my calls? For fucking ignoring me for six months?” He’s surprised his voice sounds so calm because he’s so angry. He can feel his face heating up and Zayn just stands there like he doesn’t have an answer. He doesn’t have an answer. There’s nothing he can say.

“Let me in, Ni,” Zayn repeats.

Niall shakes his head but when Zayn pushes, Niall seems to have lost all the strength in his body because he lets Zayn in and Zayn closes the door with a quiet click behind him.

Niall leans back against the wall, not sure if he’s even able to stand without support. “How did you even know where I live?” he asks.

 

“Liam,” Zayn says.

 

“Brilliant,” Niall mutters, shaking his head. “What did he say?”

 

“You’ve been ignoring calls from the guys and when they see you you’re not – you haven’t been all there, not all Niall. He didn’t say anything about me and you, just said he thinks I could try and help?” Zayn sighs and leans back against the other wall. So much distance between them.

 

Niall closes his eyes. “So, if Liam had never called you’d probably never have come here, right?”

 

“I’d still have come here,” Zayn says.

 

Niall opens his eyes and narrows them at Zayn. “You never called,” he said. “You never said you would but I didn’t think you’d need to. I just thought you would.” He can feel tears burning and he swears, holding his palms over them to stop himself from crying.

 

“Talking to you on the phone – that wouldn’t have made it better, would it? That wouldn’t have made it hurt any less. I wasn’t gonna go back.”

 

Niall shakes his head. “Why are you here?” he asks, his voice cracking. He rubs at his eyes and looks at Zayn again.

 

“Because I can’t – God, Niall, because I can’t not be here. I’ve been all over the place and everywhere I am I’m thinking, like, I wish Niall was here. I thought I needed space, but I - I don’t want it. I don’t want anything without you, you get that?”

 

Niall shakes his head again, sniffing. “No, I don’t get that.”

 

Zayn sighs and leans his head back against the wall, closing his eyes. “I knew, okay? I knew how you felt about me and I took advantage because I was feeling lonely and it took you not being there for me to realise that I felt the same.”  


Niall’s head snaps up. “What?”

 

“I feel the same,” Zayn repeats. “That’s why I’m here, Niall. I’m here because there’s nowhere else in the world that I need to be right now but here with you.”

 

“Don’t say that,” Niall whispers.

 

“I mean it. Why the fuck do you think I turned up at your house that night?”

 

And for a second Niall’s pretty sure neither of them are breathing. He isn’t sure what he’s meant to do with that. He wants to crowd Zayn up against his wall and kiss him until they’re bruised and he wants to hit him and he wants to cry and break something and he wants to start laughing until he’s sick with it.

 

Zayn doesn’t stop looking at him and it’s too much.

 

“You have a girlfriend,” Niall says and his voice sounds too loud after so much silence.

 

“Publicity, man,” Zayn mutters. His hand is in his pocket, closing around his pack of cigarettes and Niall wishes he had something to do with his hands because they feel too heavy and stupid just hanging at his sides.

 

“You said you didn’t want to date me,” Niall says.

 

“I didn’t think I did. That was – I wish I’d never said that. Wish I’d told you straight away when I got to your place instead of getting drunk and – I was so stupid, Niall. I’m so sorry.”

 

“You fucking dick,” Niall mutters but he’s moving forward and so is Zayn and they’re standing in the middle of his hall and Zayn reaches for him. His hand lands on Niall’s shoulder, fingers gripping his t shirt and Niall leans in to press their foreheads together. “I want to hit you,” Niall whispers.

 

“Go for it,” Zayn says. “I deserve it.”

 

“Fuck you. Fucking fuck you, Zayn. _Fuck you_.”

 

And Niall takes his chance, his stupid chance to lean in.

**Author's Note:**

> djtommotomlinson.tumblr.com


End file.
